FEAR II: The Fairport Conflict
by Jed Rhodes
Summary: Continuing the story of the FEAR Expansion packs Extraction Point and Perseus Mandate, featuring Dark Signal and the Nightcrawlers.
1. Interval 0: Recollection

Interval 0: Recollection.

**Point Man.**

_What's the first thing you remember_?

"This whacko's name is Paxton Fettel…"

_A life of waking from one nightmare only to find yourself deep in another…_

"You got to be fucking kidding me. This is why nobody takes us seriously, military clones...?"

_Is someone there?_

"Put Fettel down and it's over."

_I'm waiting for you..._

"You still don't know do you? Who you are? Why you're here?"

_You have no name… no history…_

I am… I am…

_The First Prototype. A failure._

I am walking through the small, apparently abandoned building. It is dark, the electric lights either switched off or failed in the years since anyone has come here, and I am forced to use my torch to see the way in places.

My mission here is to neutralise Paxton Fettel, property of Armacham Technology Corporation, and a psychic commander apparently in charge of a battalion of cloned super soldiers. This mission is of _vital_ importance, and I intend to succeed in it.

The mission is important. The mission is always important. Coming before anything.

I am in a way fortunate, in that so far there appears to be nothing particular here to stop me. The worst obstacle I have yet to face is the door to the building, which I broke through with no great effort. Still, I remain alert – better soldiers than me have been killed by being overconfident in situations that started out very much like this. I am not overconfident. I am prepared. I am alert.

I walk through the dark, dirty corridors into what appears to be a lobby entrance, filled with fire and the sounds of people in pain and babies crying – somehow, this is not strange to me – when suddenly, in this room, glass smashes – this immediately grabs my attention somehow, despite the fire and the crying and the screaming, and I aim my pistol, but it is only Spencer Jankowski, my superior and partner in the field. His empty eye sockets, bleeding down the grey skin of his face, somehow do not disturb me as much as they might any other day.

"Hey bro, what took you so long?" he asks, his voice taking on an echoing quality that it doesn't normally do. Judging from his informality, I guess that it is not a question he desires an answer to - a "rhetorical" question. People are strange like that. "Try to find another way around."

This _is_ an order - I nod and move to follow it, as he fades into ashes where he stands – I briefly wonder why he has done this, but dismiss it.

I ascend some nearby stairs until I come to double doors - something flickers on my HUD, a transmission of some kind - "unknown origin"? According to the briefing on this HUD system, which is new to me, "Unknown Origin" means that the signal I am receiving isn't anyone on our secure channels, which shouldn't by any means be possible. I approach the double doors, and I look to see a little girl standing behind the door. I immediately attempt to force open the door, and succeed in doing so…

This is strange. The little girl is gone. I ascend another set of stairs to another door in the hopes of finding her (civilians cannot be allowed to wander around a military conflict zone, even one this clandestine: the security risk they represent is great and the risk to their lives - especially if a cannibalistic lunatic is on the loose - is greater), and push against the door…

_"I hate you daddy!"_

I am back at the first set of double doors. I have no explanation for this occurrence. I shake my head, trying to clear it of a lingering fog of some kind, letting the words I heard fade out of mind. Somehow this seems - this place, what I am experiencing - very familiar but I cannot quite place how… it is irrelevant. Not part of the mission, and the mission - my orders - must come first. I continue through the building. Although I am focused on my mission, I do notice the strange occurrences: doors slamming shut, strange noises. These things, which, if I were a different, less highly trained operative, might be unnerving, cannot be explained immediately and so I do not try. Instead I remain focused on my mission. I soon link up with Jankowski. He indicates a nearby door and we stand outside it, guns raised.

"Ready?" he asks. I nod in reply. He indicates a nearby door, and we break into the room with a hearty kick. Almost immediately, Jankowski dissolves into ashes again (he seems to make a habit of doing so), the world blues slightly and feels… dreamlike, out of focus, but I still have my mission, and I advance to find

_You were born here. In this place._

a body, left sat in a chair. White male. Partially cannibalised, which is a sign of Fettel's presence – for some reason he eats his victims; our technical specialist, Jin Sun-Kwon – for some reason thinking of her elicits a twinge that is not fear, dislike or suspicion, but I have no time to think about this – believes that he consumes the bodies for a very specific reason. Jankowski returns, and radios for Jin to come here and look at the body. At Jankowski's instruction, I search for Fettel, ignoring the lingering

_I was there._

feeling that I am missing something – something vitally important. What could it be?

This is all wrong. All of it. Something is nagging at the back of my mind as it shouldn't nag the mind of someone with my training. I know my mission must come first, but my mind wanders, as I have not let it in so many years...

So caught up am I in these strange thoughts that when I turn a corner and am hit in the face with a plank, I barely notice, instead blacking out for a moment. Over my dazed state, I hear a voice.

"It's you. Well, well. I am surprised."

I open my eyes, setting them on Paxton Fettel ("…property of Armacham Technology Corporation. They're working on a contract to create an army of clones that respond to a psychic commander") in person for the first time (_and not the last_).

"I suppose I shouldn't be. There is no such thing as coincidence, is there?" he smiles, half quizzically, half sadistically. "The dead man's name…" _was Charles Habbeger. I remember him… but are the memories mine or hers?_

Mother...?

_It makes no difference. He deserved to die._

I remember now. This happened before. This – what I am now experiencing – is nothing but a memory. And I am, therefore, dreaming.

_They all deserve to die._

And then a voice grabs me and hauls me awake.

"Wake Up Brother."

* * *

><p>Dreams are something I should not have been having. I don't have time to dream. I don't have time to sleep. My eyes snap open, and I am as alert as I can be, and I find myself staring into Paxton Fettel's dead eyes: at least, he's <em>meant<em>to be dead. Saying that, being "meant-to-be-dead" doesn't seem to be a guarantee of anything anymore. He is also, as I have only recently discovered, my brother, not the first unwelcome family revelation of the night but certainly one of the more unpleasant one's, given the fact that he is an insane cannibal. And now a ghost.

"I see your little beauty sleep hasn't done you any good," he says, smirking. I want to shoot him, for a variety of reasons, many of which are to do with the bad night I have been having, but I can barely move. "I suppose it's pointless telling you that no more help is coming and that you might as well give, you'll presumably just try to fight anyway."

I summon the energy to spit at him. Since he is insubstantial it goes right through him, and he frowns at me, more in annoyance than genuine anger.

"Now is that any way to treat your brother?" he asks. I ignore him, and stand up, and he fades away into dust. "Fine," his voice says all around me. "I'll leave mother to pay her respects." I ignore this – in retrospect, this will turn out to be a mistake – and begin limping back the way I came, only to see a familiar visage that seems to be standing in the far doorway – a visage that has been haunting me, stalking me, all night.

Tall, emaciated, naked, fire in her eyes, and in fact behind her as well, which suggests that she is attempting to destroy the entire building – I experience another twinge as I realise Jin Sun-Kwon's body is still in the building but I ignore this.

My mother, Alma Wade. This one, the angry, adult version that has been assailing me all night, killing my friends indirectly (Jin - and some part of me I wasn't sure I had squirms slightly, though I immediately brush it off - and Holiday, about the only competent member of Delta Force I've met, although there has to be some new way of measuring competence around the undead nightmarish creations of a tortured psychic and her deceased, cannibalistic son) and generally being evil, is now apparently blowing up the hospital. Fuck this, I decide. Even though the course of action I take is suicidal and will no doubt lead to my painful and very messy demise, she is my enemy and I'm going to take her down, one way or another.

I grab my pistol, still thankfully in its holster, and begin firing at her, determined to at least go down fighting. She sends nightmares - creatures that float on no legs and have glowing eyes - towards me, and I destroy them with ease – they dissipate with one shot. I am momentarily confused. Not at the way she's attacking - though tactical sense would have had her materialising near me and liquifying me, tactical sense from a dead woman with the mind of a tortured eight year old having the mother of all temper tantrums isn't something I expect. No, the thing that confuses me is something I _think_ I've seen previously (I say 'think' because, as this entire situation proves, nothing is certain anymore). Alma's emaciated adult form that is attacking me here is not the only one running around.

Bizarrely (by even the standards of this strange situation), there is also a version that takes the form of the eight year old, red dress wearing homicidal maniac child that menaced me before, during my entire mission to kill Fettel, except that one is now - apparently - benevolent, at least towards me. As Paxton Fettel himself said earlier, nothing much makes sense anymore. The confusing thing is, the red dress wearing child and the emaciated adult appeared to unite in one of the many psychic episodes I have had while I've been in this place, on this insane mission. Does that mean she definitely wants me dead in both forms? Or was what I was seeing something else?

It doesn't matter. This night has been one long run, an exercise in futility, a walk towards my inevitable fate, which is, apparently, here now.

She walks towards me, taking her time as I empty clip after clip into her. My mother - another unwelcome familial revelation of the night.

It is, I suppose, ironic that the night I find out who most of my family are, they all die, in rather unpleasant ways.

Harlan Wade, your classic evil scientist who sees the light at the end. A monster to be sure, but he apparently _knew_ he was. "It is the way of men to make monsters, and it is the nature of monsters to destroy their makers," he said. Did he regret every horrible thing he did? Maybe.

Alice Wade, apparently my aunt, so cheerful and alive. Young, as well.

Images flash in my mind of the two, in a sanitorium, in another vision I've had this night. Alice so scared and shaking, Harlan sat in a corner, slumped and resigned. Though he could be said to deserve his fate, somehow I can't agree with that about Alice.

Family. A strange concept. Before my brother made me question my heritage it had never occurred to me that I lacked something others had. I would often hear Jankowski speak of his younger brother or Jin of her parents, and I never thought to wonder, "why don't I have that?" It is not my place to wonder, I would think. I will follow orders, and complete my mission, I would think. It's strange that I never knew them, and seemingly never wanted to – why is that? Was I programmed not to care by Armacham? I find I do not even truly care now – my motivation for this, what will probably be my final act, is still the mission. I wouldn't put it past Armacham to have programmed me to be like this, but if so, why did they not just kill me? Why am I here? What do they gain?

Thinking back to the question of family, my attention must of course turn to two of the nastier members of that constantly shrinking group: Paxton Fettel and Alma Wade, both returning to consistently haunt me.

She is still there, not fading into ash even as I keep firing every bullet I have left at her. She keeps walking, reaching the stairs. I back away, firing more. I am going to die fighting my mother. Will I return as a ghost? If I do, I swear I will haunt those two forever.

Suddenly, I hear a noise I could not have hoped for: another helicopter. Rodney Betters must have apparently sent it to pick me up after losing contact with the earlier one. Alma has vanished through a door, meaning that any moment now she will enter from the door to my right as I look for the copter. I face the door, aiming my pistol, even as the copter closes in. Then, without warning, she charges out of the door at what seems like the speed of light, grabbing my arms and pushing me to my knees, staring into my eyes with dead eye sockets…

Bullets rip through her flesh from the general direction of the incoming chopper, and from her lips comes an unearthly _hissing_ sound as she turns to face the cause of her pain - and I take my chance, grabbing her thin form - it is surprisingly easy to do so, given how dangerous she supposedly is - and pitching her off the top of the building, watching her fall. I don't know whether she vanished before impact or fell to the street and I truly don't care. Instead of looking, I await the chopper, and as it lands I jump on quickly, allowing it to leave before she repeats the trick that crashed myself, Jin and Holiday in the first place.

Fettel doesn't bother wrecking this one I notice. I briefly wonder why, but remain thankful that he has decided to leave me alone for the time being.

I sit down, and face my rescuers, both men in F.E.A.R uniform, one older and grizzled, one younger, sporting a goatee. He seems familiar…

"David Raynes," the older man said. I nod at him. "Any survivors from your squad?"

I shake my head no, gaze still wandering to the other man. He looks back at me impassively, and neither of us speak. This man is something different… I can't place my finger on it. I sigh and remain silent as the helicopter continues its journey.


	2. Interval 1: Exploration

Interval 1: Exploration.

**Dark Signal**

It wasn't just the Auburn District that had been hit by that massive, nuclear (or it damn looked like nuclear anyway, though radiation had not massively increased) explosion.

Hell, they'd be lucky if the entire city was the only damage. Fairport was a fucking mess. In fact, "Fucking Mess" had become it's new name in the man's mind. And you know, the explosion - right as his team were about to reach a data storage facility to support their fellow Delta Force members - wouldn't have been so bad. Really, it was FUBAR and stuff but not actually that terrible from a "we can deal with this" kind of perspective. But as for… whatever it was that happened after…

He didn't know or want to know how to describe it. Ghostly visions, flashes of… _something_ following them. Things. They had seen one survivor so far, but before they could reach him he was dragged into the floor by a shadow, and rather messily too, his remains splattering across the ground. They had been careful to avoid shadows after that.

Eventually, after a couple of hours of trying to drive around, maybe find some other Delta's, they had heard that an Extraction Point was being set up at a hospital for their fellow Delta Force soldiers, so they decided to take a ride there. Not that it was so easy as it sounded.

For some reason, members of his team - including himself - had been having headaches, and seeing visions of… something. A little girl? A swing? They had all been having headaches, but the fact that whenever they could catch any sleep their dreams were the same. Grass. Trees. Her.

The man's name was Michael Becket, and the team he was a member was a Delta Force team codenamed Dark Signal. He - together with his teammates "Top" Griffin, Keira Stokes, Harold Keegan, Redd Jankowski, James Fox and their self appointed driver (and occasional morale officer) Manuel Morales - had been despatched to support fellow SFOD-D troopers in the area, and been caught up in what Becket could only describe as "unnatural fuckery". They were fortunate that nothing was apparently able to get into the APC or they'd really be in the shit.

They were currently driving down a ruined street, attempting to locate any survivors. There weren't any that they had seen since the unfortunate person who had met a messy demise in the streets. Suddenly, Manny stopped the APC, and everybody jerked in their seats.

"Manny, what's up?" Top asked.

The driver turned around in his seat, and turned to face Top.

"You wanna look outside and see for yourself, Top," he said, very seriously. Just as Top was about to ask why, Manny added "seriously, man."

Top frowned, then motioned to Becket and Stokes to follow him.

* * *

><p>Ok, this was just scary. It was an air force jet plane - a big one too, not a combat fighter - crashed right over a subway entrance. Nearby was the entrance to a warehouse area, and rather conspicuously, a lot of blood.<p>

"This shit just ain't right," Top muttered. Becket nodded silently in agreement, while Stokes wandered over to the entrance to the subway.

"Looks like something blew out these lights, Top," she said, pointing down into the darkness. Becket and Top walked over to her. Behind them, from out of the APC, came Fox, Keegan and Jankowski. Redd had been quieter than his usual self since the explosion - even calling Becket "Becket" rather than his degrading, and (in his mind anyway) witty pseudonym, "Bucket," which by the cocksure young man's standards was pretty much unheard of.

"You ok Redd?" Keegan asked.

"Yeah, just got a feeling of… something," Jankowski replied. He looked around, as if searching for someone, and then his eyes alighted on a small alleyway - and the distant but very familiar figure stumbling down it. "Spen?" Almost immediately, he took off after the shambling form of his brother.

"Redd!" Keegan yelled. Top looked up to see the young soldier rounding the alleyway.

"Shit!" he swore. "Keegan, Fox, go after him!"

The two men nodded and sprinted after their comrade. Becket meanwhile was shining a light down into the subway entrance when it alighted upon someone - a girl, about eight, with a red dress on. She looked up at the light and laughed, before rushing further in.

"Top," Becket called, "unaccompanied minor. Girl, eight, red dress."

"Get after her!" Top yelled, too preoccupied by Jankowski wandering off to think too clearly. Becket looked at Stokes, briefly considering asking her to come with him, but then took off alone. He was a Delta Force operative, elite of the elite. He did not need help finding one little girl.

* * *

><p>Redd Jankowski was not afraid, although he knew he should be, somehow. The figure of his brother kept eluding him, vanishing before he could find him. He had to find him.<p>

Spen and Redd were not as close as they could have been. Redd was a rowdy youth and Spen a responsible older brother. Spen had been hoping to play basketball professionally, but had instead helped Redd pass his exams and achieve his dream of joining the army. Spen had followed him to look after him but they had taken separate paths. Spen to F.E.A.R, Redd to Delta Force. Quite why Spen would be out here was unclear to Redd, but he _was_. Redd had to help him.

"Spen?" he asked, moving forward. "Are you here?"

"Is someone there?" the voice of his brother floated around a corner, and Redd raced ahead.

"Spen! You here?" he called. Then he saw him.

Grey, dead skin, eyes reduced to gaping sockets, dust and ash falling from him.

"Redd?" this apparition said, and Redd gasped in shock. How could his brother still be alive? "Redd, you have to run. She is near here…"

And with that, he dissolved into ashes, revealing that he had been standing over a pool of blood. Redd looked down at it, then crouched, picking up a blood soaked dog tag that had the name "Douglas Holiday" on it. Holiday? He'd been a Master Sergeant assigned to the Armacham HQ mission, and he'd also been the one who'd helped set up the hospital extraction point. Redd cursed softly at another dead Delta, and looked at the bloody pool which stretched up to a window. There was apparently nothing left of Holiday except - and here Redd felt vaguely sick - an arm. A motherfucking arm.

Just then, Top, Fox and Keegan rounded the corner Spen's… ghost? Had come around, and Redd turned to face them.

"Where's your brother?" Top said, sounding pissed.

"You won't believe me," Redd said.

"And what the fuck is that?" Fox asked, pointing at the bloody pool. Reds tossed him the dog-tag, and Fox showed it to Top, who swore.

"I knew him. Good man," he said. "Alright, if we're finished sight seeing…"

The men walked off, not noticing the small figure of a little girl in floral dress looking down at them from above, her yellow eyes shining in the darkness.

* * *

><p>Becket hated dark spaces, especially dark spaces like this with shit loads of dead shit in it. Whoever had come in here butchering both Replica's and these black body suited men was a cold-as-stone killer, no doubt, and Becket seriously didn't want to meet them. He walked further forward, and then stopped, as a strange sight came into view.<p>

A perfectly normal woman - forty, but wearing it well, with spectacles and a gleaming intellect in her eye, walked out of a door. She looked around the bodies with a slight frown, tsked, then looked up at Becket. She frowned slightly at him, not irritated, but fascinated, walked a couple of steps towards him, then seemed to see something more interesting behind another door and walked through that. Becket ran after her - not only was she a civilian to be rescued (and apparently an unshockable one judging from her reaction to the bodies) but she might have seen the girl. Becket opened the door - but the woman was nowhere to be seen. There was a small control panel, and a few ashes dissolving over it, but no sign of the woman. Becket turned around, annoyed.

The woman was staring right at him, scrutinising him carefully behind the glasses she wore. She narrowed her eyes - yellow eyes - at him, before backing off. She nodded at him, carefully, as if deeming him acceptable, and then… she _dissolved into ash._ Becket swore and aimed his gun, but there was nothing there.

"What the fuck," he said more than asked. He quickly ran out of the subway, meeting up with the still waiting Stokes.

"Find the kid?" she asked. He shook his head, shocked and half-terrified by what he had witnessed. Just then, Redd turned a corner, Top, Fox and Keegan following.

"I'm telling you man," Redd was saying, "my brother turned to ashes right in front of me."

"And I'm telling you that ain't possible," Top replied.

"Redd, maybe you need a rest," Fox said reasonably. "I'm sure your brother's fine."

"What are you staring at, Bucket?" Redd snapped at Becket, who had been staring at him. Becket looked back at the subway, and then back at Redd.

"Did you just say, 'dissolved into ashes'?" he asked.

"Yeah, and?" Redd asked.

"Well," Becket said, "you won't believe what I just saw…"

* * *

><p>They all deserved to die. The people in the streets. All the men with guns. Even her living son, who had shot at her. Betrayal. Betrayal everywhere. Hatred and betrayal and hatred and…<p>

In the astral plane she inhabited, which took the form of grass, and trees, and one tree in particular with a swing, something changed. She looked up, to see the other parts - the weaker parts - of herself staring at her. The one who was what she could have been, and the one who was what she once had been. Innocent child and normal, logical woman. Nearby, hiding behind the tree from - well, everything, was the other little girl. The scared one with the battered face and the tattered dress. On the swing itself, the other girl - rabid motherly instinct gone mad - swung, ignoring the anger until it threatened one of their children. Oh, so many parts were children, because that was what she had been for so long: a scared child. BUT NO LONGER! She was strong! Hate, incarnate!

The various fractured parts were sundered by the mental tortures that Alma had endured - for so long she had held it together, reaching out with her will in the only form she knew she had, the little girls form, but as soon as she had been released she had shattered into pieces, rage alone driving her onward. She had tried to embrace her firstborn, but he had shot her and run from her. He was no better than the rest. He was _no_ better. He was scum like them! He deserved to die. They all deserved to die! All of them! He had eluded her again - but not forever. Oh, she would find him and melt him, and scour his essence and torture it like she did _Daddies Favourite Girl_ and Daddy himself and the one who had taken her child and…

_"Don't hurt him,"_ one part of her whispered, and the little red-dress wearing girl, the form she had seen her second son in, which had now taken on her violent protective instincts, looked at her, having materialised away from the swing. She had sensed her other self's anger from her position and moved to counter it. The Anger hissed and snarled. She would do as she pleased. It was her anger that had kept her/them alive, where a normal person might have just died and let their revenge go into nothingness. It was her anger that would choose their path now.

The red-dress wearing girl vanished - she had to find her first born. The floral dress girl - younger still than the one in red and the very epitome of innocence (hence why she was small and young, because Alma's innocence hadn't lasted long at all) looked up at the older woman (so normal. Sickening that it even existed in Alma, this person, this part of her, when she was RAGE INCARNATE ITSELF). The woman looked down at the girl, and made a face that suggested that she had no clues as to how to proceed, before she too vanished. Finally, the little girl vanished too, leaving the anger alone with itself.

It didn't care. It didn't need anyone else. It had the rage that had kept them going for so long, and that was enough. 


	3. Interval 2: Deliberation

Interlude: In Death's Clutches.

**Alma's World**

Harlan Wade, mad scientist, arsehole, murderer, a monster who had been his own creator, father, and very guilty man - more guilty than he supposed anyone would ever give him credit for - wasn't getting tortured in hell, and this bugged him more than he ever thought it would. Although he'd never been this guilty before.

He had let his insane, supposedly dead daughter (didn't stop her from walking out of the door and fucking vaporising him, oh no) out of the Vault she had been kept in, knowing full well she'd kill him, precisely because he felt he deserved it; which he did, given that the only reason she was in that Vault was him. It hadn't surprised him that he'd ended up in what appeared to be a sanitarium, which was apparently controlled by Alma herself. It hadn't surprised him that she had come, stared at him for what felt like a year and then just left, abandoning him like he had abandoned her. He had sat, slumped in a corner, alone, except for the brief moments when nightmares of one sort or another would pop up at the window and stare at him.

He had, to be honest, expected a bit more from hell. No matter: he accepted the quiet, closed his eyes and let it wash over him, waiting for the pain to start.

"Hey! Let go of me!"

He opened his eyes, and saw his door opening. Something - it looked vaguely like a scarecrow - dragged a young Asian man into the cell, and threw him next to Harlan. Quite why he was being thrown in here was beyond Harlan's reckoning, but he didn't complain.

"Hello," he said. The Asian man looked over at him, as if expecting him to turn into a demon of some sort at any moment. "Don't worry, I'm as much a prisoner as you are."

The Asian man smiled. "Yeah?" he said. "Well I'm not exactly a prisoner. I shouldn't even be here, the last thing I remember was being dead."

"You _are_ dead," Harlan replied. "This is Alma's mind."

"Uh huh," the young man replied. "Alma being…?"

"My daughter," Harlan sighed, taking his glasses off and wiping them on his coat. A futile gesture on his part given his slight state of death, but old habits die hard. "My name's Harlan Wade. Yours?"

"Steve Chen," the man replied. "And just so you know, 'your daughter' isn't a comforting answer."

"I know that, and I'm sorry for it," Harlan said, smiling grimly Chen looked at him for a moment, then sighed.

"Man, this shit is fucked up," he said, slumping against a wall. "Holes in the floor that eat you - and let me tell you, that in and of itself was pretty fucking bad."

Harlan nodded sympathetically. If he thought hard enough, he could recall his own, pretty appalling demise too, having been liquified like so many others. Needless to say, he didn't think about it much.

"But then instead of pearly gates like I think I deserve for, you know, being a decent guy - or I hope I was a decent guy anyway," he added as an afterthought. Harlan laughed - he knew he hadn't been a decent person, or a semi decent person, or for that matter an anything-other-than-downright-evil person. "I get an afterlife that looks like a nuthouse from every bad movie you've ever seen, creepy little girls…"

"Creepy little girl?" Harlan asked, shocked out of his reverie. "Eight years old, black hair, red dress?"

"Yeah," Chen said slowly.

"That's her," Wade said. "When did you see her?"

"Does it matter?" Chen asked.

"It might be the key to us getting out of here," Harlan replied very seriously, his scientist mind already at work. He didn't really want to escape per se - he deserved this place and it's horror - but if this man, unrelated to this horror, was here, others - _Alice_ - might be too. And if they were, he was damned if he would let them suffer for his crimes. He had been a monster long enough.

* * *

><p>Interval 2. Deliberation.<p>

**FEAR Briefing Room, Field Command Post.**

It was difficult to have a decent briefing when two of the people you were trying to debrief were totally silent regardless of situation or anything you said, but Rodney Betters made it look easy. He was used to working with the quiet types.

The first FEAR team's Point Man - and Rodney had never thought of him by any other name, which struck him as odd - stood at the back of the impromptu briefing room - an armoured van at the edge of the city with a large screen for help briefing troops. The Sergeant from the second team sat on a chair, watching intently. Captain David Raynes watched the screen from a different chair. Nearby were two replacement operatives - one for each FEAR team - a wiry man named Peter Jones and a more heavily built man named Alexander Thomason.

"Alright," Betters said. "Here's the situation. Paranormal mindfuckery is overrunning the streets of Fairport. Before you ask, we managed to get a lot of civilians out of there, and lots more seem to have 'had a feeling' telling them to go." Betters frowned. "But there's still a couple of thousand civilians in there and according to our reports, they won't have survived."

"Damn," Raynes said.

"Quite," Betters said. "Anyway, with Paxton Fettel seemingly back in business inexplicably, the Replica's are a threat again, and we have reason to believe there's more Replica's than just the one's from the prototype battalion. In fact, we have information making us think there's at least four thousand of them in there."

"Thanks for making my day," one of the new guys - Thomason - muttered.

"By the way, Raynes," Betters said, pointing at the two, "that there's Thomason, he'll be your new Sergeant. As for you," Betters said, looking at Raynes' old Sergeant, who was looking at him with a blank look, "I think you're due that promotion to Lieutenant."

Raynes punched his Sergeant in the shoulder in a show of camaraderie. The new Lieutenant gave a faint smile that was fairly half hearted but it was the most Betters had seen out of him, and he took it as happiness. The Point Man from the other team nodded at him in a show of respect, and the Lieutenant nodded back.

"We'll celebrate later," Betters said. The FEAR co-ordinator sighed, clearly less than thrilled about what he had to say next. "I'm afraid, given the circumstances, FEAR has had to declare Stage 0."

Raynes and the more experienced FEAR troopers started slightly, while Jones and Thomason, being less experienced, looked absolutely shocked. Stage 0 was the final stage. War being declared by the entire FEAR organisation.

"Raynes, I'm giving you field command," Betters said, grimly. "Your first objective is to secure a foothold near the warehousing district for Delta Force reserves. Can you do that?"

"Yes sir," Raynes said at once. "There was apparently some Replica activity near there, but I believe it was… taken care of." The older man gave the Point Man a look, and the Point Man returned it, unblinking.

"Alright," Betters nodded. "Now, Den Mother has promised me reinforcements, with the caveat that we have to scout the area with a small number of troops. Essentially, you five, plus medical technician." The Point Man shifted in his seat at that, but Betters ignored him. "That and we have to look for a missing Delta team."

"That happens a lot," Raynes noted.

"Price of working so closely with SFOD," Betters said. "I don't regret it. FEAR doesn't have the manpower for half the shit we're facing, and Dark Signal comes highly recommended."

"We're ready sir," Raynes said.

"Excellent," Betters said. "Get to it Raynes."

Raynes motioned to the Lieutenant and Sergeant Thomason, and the three of them walked out. "Jones," Betters continued, "you'll be working with Point here," the co-ordinator indicated the Point Man.

The new guy looked confused. "Doesn't he have a name?"

"Yes," Betters said without elaborating. "You'll be working with him as part of his squad. Point," Betters said, turning to the silent killing machine. "Your technicians' one Jacob Calhoun. He's got more weapons training than Jin had, so you should be fine with him." Point Man said nothing, instead standing up and saluting, before walking out. Jones looked at Betters, who sighed.

"Well get after him!" he said. Jones scurried after the Point Man.

* * *

><p><strong>Point Man.<strong>

"You know, I've heard you took on half the Replica Battallion by yourself and won," the new guy says to me, all eagerness and over-politeness. "That's pretty badass."

_I hear you're a bad motherfucker. I hope it's true._

He's too eager. Too cheerful. I almost wish he'd shut up but my professionalism stops me - we all start somewhere.

_You will be a God among men._

Some of us from stranger beginnings than others.

Men bustle all around. Soldiers in FEAR uniforms, armed with varying weapons. All of them look tense. I suppose because FEAR has never deployed in force before. I lead the new guy to a grizzled man in a uniform similar to Jin's… why does thinking about her make my stomach twist? Still, she is dead and I have a mission to complete, and I will not fail my mission.

"Jacob Calhoun," the man says to me, holding out a hand. I shake it. "Betters tells me you don't speak much, which is good because silent soldiers are the best kind in my opinion."

He looks at Jones, who looks a little intimidated.

"And this is your first mission with FEAR, yes?" he says. "Don't worry. I'll watch your back." He looks at me again. "Betters has put me in charge of the squad, but Raynes is in overall command." He stops as Raynes calls us over.

"Alright," the Captain says. "Calhoun, take Jones and… your Point Man and secure the foothold point. Clear any Replicas, find Dark Signal if you can. We'll meet up with more FEAR troops and a Delta platoon ASAP."

"Understood sir," Calhoun nods. He motions to myself and Jones and we run over to an APC with an SFOD driver.

"I know your stop," he says, "hold on tight." I ignore this piece of advice - rough rides don't bother me. I've been through plenty.

Something tells me this one's going to be the worst. 


	4. Interval 3: Invasion

Interval 3: Invasion.

FEAR Main Advance.

Raynes led the main force - thirty FEAR troops at the moment, with promise of Delta Force reinforcement from Den Mother - on foot through the ruined, deserted streets. He couldn't lie and say he particularly liked the way the streets looked now but he was thankful it wasn't as bad as it could have been. The Origin Facility explosion - as the report had called it - had caused horrendous damage, but it hadn't been nuclear despite it's mushroom cloud appearance, so while hundreds - if not thousands - of people were dead, the country at large was more or less intact and there would be no nuclear fallout.

He couldn't say there would be _absolutely_ no fallout of any kind. Many thousands of people were dead now, and if Fettel and his Replica legion got out that number would escalate rapidly.

"Sir?" Thomason said, pointing ahead. There was a civilian, limping across the road, apparently uninterested in the army heading his way. He held a briefcase in his hand and was apparently attempting to hail a cab.

There were no cabs.

"Lieutenant," Raynes said, "investigate the civilian." He had seen enough fucked up things tonight to know that the civilian ahead of him could not have survived unscathed physically or mentally: better safe than sorry. The Lieutenant nodded, and advanced, gun raised, the very model of military efficiency.

* * *

><p><strong>The Lieutenant<strong>

Thoughts don't seem to plague me as often as my colleagues. When given an order I simply obey it, I do not question or think about that order. I have never even wondered why I am like this. Well, no, that is a lie. I have often wondered, briefly. No one has ever told me, and as a human I am naturally curious. But unlike others I do not let such thoughts override my sense of duty and purpose, or distract me from my objectives.

It is obvious why the Captain ordered me forward rather than the others. Obvious too why he shuffles his thirty men - men whose lives are his responsibility - away from view. Whatever the "civilian" is, it might well be dangerous. Myself and Raynes - as well as our late comrade, Lieutenant Chen - have fought against monsters these past two nights, and I know what I am doing against such things.

Strange how easily that thought comes to me."Definitely through the looking glass," as Chen put it, and though I did not get the reference, I know it's meaning.

I approach slowly, the "civilian" not noticing my approach. I don't speak much, and I don't speak here: I intend to, but the noise of my footsteps has clearly gotten it's - his - attention. It turns to face me, and I know immediately that it was a very good idea of Raynes' to stay back: this thing has boils down it's face, blank, dead eyes, and as I watch it, red lines seem to emerge, grabbing hold of nearby dead bodies - they appear to be Replicas but some ATC security appear to be present as well as one or two of those "Nightcrawlers" I've been fighting over the night. The bodies are getting up and aiming at me… but I'm already aiming at the "civilian". I fire once, it shrieks, fire twice -

It screeches, light flashing in my eyes, and I am blasted backwards; I land in a heap a few metres away. I immediately fire on a nearby body that's advancing on me, and I then aim at the "civilian" again, firing my RPL until finally, after almost exhausting my clip, the thing drops, with a final mournful screech. It dissolves into ashes like so many things I've fought tonight.

"Clear?" I hear Raynes call. I stand up and wave an all clear at the FEAR troops, and the team moves forward. I hope I don't meet any of those things again. They seem to be more trouble then they're -

FLASH

_I stumble, and when I look up the figures of Raynes and his cohort are dissolving into ashes. I want to scream in horror but nothing happens. Then I realise: this is familiar, this sensation. Like many of the hallucinations I've been having these past few days, it feels dreamlike and unreal but, no doubt, has deadly danger in the middle of it._

_And there she is._

_Although she is a little girl, maybe eight years old, my soldier's mind cannot help but imagine her as being a target. And a very dangerous one at that. I cannot forget the Nightcrawlers, among the most dangerous enemies I have fought, being tossed around by her as though she were nothing._

_I can't move. I assume it's her doing. I try but all I can do is watch her approach me._

_****_**You aren't him.__**_ a voice whispers. _**You look like him but you aren't him.**_ She sounds annoyed but not _really_ angry. I've seen her power - if she was _really _angry I'd already be dead. ****_**Who are you?__**

_She roots through my mind - painfully, as I feel every inexpert tug - until she finds -_

If you fail us you and your fellow soldiers will die. If you succeed, you will herald a new age.__

_I do not recognise this memory, and apparently not sufficiently moved by what she has seen to be homicidal, she settles for blasting me backwards…_

And the world snaps back to reality. I hear footsteps approaching me, and soon the face of Captain Raynes appears over me, looking concerned. The world begins to fade out, but I can hear a voice speaking.

_The first prototype is the epitome of the perfect soldier. Imagine if we could have fifty of those. A hundred. Four hundred._

I don't know what they mean, nor do I care, too busy I am focusing on military strategies for dealing with the girl. She is a threat, clearly, and when I wake up it is clear that I will have to deal with her for the sake of the mission.

I will have to deal with her.

I have to deal…

I have to…

I have

I…

* * *

><p>Interlude: Saving Your Soul.<p>

**Alma's World**

"Can you say that again please?" Chen said after Harlan had explained himself, the confusion in the soldier's face almost making Harlan nostalgic for the days when he was dealing solely with 140 IQ plus scientists.

"I believe," Harlan said again, slower than before, "that you may have psychic ability. You might be able to use it to get us out of here."

Chen gawped at him for a long moment, and Harlan watched patiently. He was in hell, patience was a prerequisite. Besides, he'd waited twenty years to have a chance to let Alma out. Patience was his great virtue. Now, anyway. Before, he hadn't been able to wait for evolution, and had sacrificed his family on the alter of progress.

"Even saying I believed you," the Lieutenant finally said, "how would I go about getting us out of here?"

Bullshitting on the spot, Harlan replied. "You have psychic ability and this realm is a psychic construct, with our consciousnesses somehow retained here, imprisoned. If you can gather enough willpower, you can help us escape."

"How do I do that?" Chen asked.

"What is your favourite gun?" Harlan asked. Chen looked bemused.

"Why does that…"

"Just answer the question," Harlan said tiredly. Chen thought about it for a moment.

"Vollmer Vk-12 shotgun," he said at last. "Thing's a beast."

"Ok," Harlan said. "Imagine one. Every curve, every line, full magazine."

Chen did so. For a long moment, nothing happened.

"Concentrate," Harlan said, remembering - unwillingly - moments when he had forced the prototypes to concentrate to perform certain tasks. Then even more unwillingly, he remembered moments when he had made ALMA concentrate to perfect certain tasks. He had once thought of the prototypes merely as tools to be harnessed, but now he knew his mistake.

Finally, something happened. Out of nothing, a long, sleek shotgun materialised, reality warping around it for a moment.

"Good," Harlan said. "It is as real now as you want it to be." He didn't know if that was actually true but hey, he didn't have much of a choice. "Shoot the lock of the door."

"What'll happen?" Chen asked.

"Exactly what would happen if you shot the real lock of a real door," Harlan assured him. Chen nodded, racked the imaginary shotgun for good measure, feeling the reassuring weight of it, accepting that it was real. _There is no - fork? Knife? What bit of cutlery was it? Ah the hell with it, I hated that movie anyway._

He fired. The lock shattered and the door opened, and Harlan immediately pushed past Chen.

"Alice?" he called. "Alice?"

"Dad?" a small, weak voice called. Harlan walked over to a nearby sanitarium door, looking through the shutter. Through the window he could see his daughter, crying and afraid. He motioned Chen over.

"Get away from the door, sweetie," he said.

"Dad," she said, softly. "He's here…"

Chen blasted the lock for Harlan, allowing him to open the door to see his daughter. And her guest.

It was humanoid, barely, deformed and monstrous. As Harlan watched, it transformed into - he nearly vomited before he remembered he technically no longer possessed a stomach.

It transformed into _him_. younger, with dark hair and moustache, wearing his old jacket and suit. Him in his prime, before he had realised what a fucked-up monster he had become. Back in the days when he ran a thousand different programs for ATC. A version of himself he hated, and he was fairly certain everyone else hated too.

The image of a young Harlan Wade looked at the real Harlan with a malicious grin. 


End file.
